Novel Update #4: Getting lost…

In my ongoing editing journey for my yet-to-be-published Novel (Yes hope is alive and well again), I found something so comfortable in getting lost in my characters today.

The mainstay of Fallout, is the relationship between Mary and Sam. Today I tackled, in a flashback, how they met during a New Year’s Eve party some six years before marrying.

The flashback floods Mary’s mind while in the midst of the same group of friends, only Mary has removed herself from the room and is quietly washing dishes alone. I have written and reviewed that scene so many times by now that it’s practically become part of my own memories.

A romantic relationship is always fun to write. Of course, it can take you all over the place. High HIGHS, Low lows, passion, playfulness, grief, madness, and all the extra drama and baggage in between.

In my first Novel, Disarmed by a Smile, the setting was a few months post University Convocation. There was much drama between Abby, the good Catholic girl, and Jake, the jock womanizing player. Even though I attempted to layer it with complexities creating 3-dimensional characters that had more going on than an episode of Gossip Girl, it was still an immature environment in which to discuss the nature of Love.

In Fallout, the characters are some years away from being university grads. They are all in successful stimulating careers and enjoy the work they do. They have responsibilities, challenges, thoughts and feelings related to their appropriate 30’s. And it is in this setting, that the colourful nature of a more mature love can develop.

Sure there is a supporting cast of immature friends who haven’t quite found their place yet, regardless of age. But I wanted to paint Mary and Sam as different from college kids Abby and Jake. They have their struggles at work. They adore each other passionately yet they are best friends with a depth of love and understanding that the most fortunate of us can hope for in a marital union (and I can proudly boast). They sense change in each other. They share joys and laughter. But above all, at the heart of everything is the fact that they truly enjoy being with one another.

In the New Year’s Eve scene, they collide by accident (or is it fate?). Their own awkwardness yet obvious attraction for each other grows exponentially in a matter of a few hours. But their connection is not based in mere physical attraction. There is substance. There is something that clicks inside drawing them together. Their first kiss comes before the drama of relationship-hood and strangely it is that, that keeps their curiosity in one another alive and flourishing.

I hope I can best portray their story in a fluid, enjoyable and enticing way… before I must send them off into the world.